


And the Toast Isn't Even Warm

by oddmonster



Category: The Tick - All Media Types
Genre: Caper Fic, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-08
Updated: 2013-01-08
Packaged: 2017-11-24 04:46:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/630578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oddmonster/pseuds/oddmonster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>American Maid fights crime. It's what she does, even if she has to use sick time to do it. A hot villainess on her couch isn't part of the equation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And the Toast Isn't Even Warm

May sat upright but swaying with the motion of the subway carriage as she thought about all the different ways molded plastic seats had not been designed with superheroes in mind.

_Not to mention superheroines_ , she thought, unsticking her thighs from the ridged edges and settling down into a borrowed North Face fleece, thrown hastily over her star-spangled bustier.

_Then again, what kind of career requires women to wear sequined briefs on public transport?_

This was all her mother's fault.

It had been a phone call weekend and Myrna Maldenovsky had answered her daughter's call on the fourth ring. Not the second, or the third, even though both of them well knew that May phoned every other Sunday without fail at 10 am, early enough to catch Myrna before her bridge club.

There'd been the usual: why don't you have a real job, when are you going back to grad school, have you managed to meet any nice boys yet (Myrna staunchly refused to acknowledge the whole lesbian aspect of her daughter's life), and then Myrna had launched into a long story about her friend Edna’s youngest, and how Edna and Stan had been horrified to find out from their rabbi that the girl had taken a job dancing at a not-so-nice place in an outfit that left very little to the imagination. Then Myrna had coughed discreetly and let a pause grow between them. In the pause, she did not at all say, _And how is your little American Maid thing going? You know, the one where you run around the city late at night with your ass hanging out?_

For her part, May simply wondered what a rabbi had been doing at a strip club in the first place.

The train rattled into a tunnel and all the lights dimmed, swallowed by the subterranean darkness. May hoped no one would decide to take the opportunity to start something; the elastic of her gold sequined shorts was biting at her mid-section and stilettos, while awesomely effective as thrown weapons, blew goat-dick as everyday workwear.

_For this,_ Myrna was forever saying, _you gave up a perfectly good job with The City? One with benefits and a 401K. I just want to make sure I still understand._

But high heels or no, May had to admit she loved her life as a superhero.

Besides, she hadn’t exactly given up her job as a social worker. Just cut back her hours.

\---

The call came over the police band at 2:37pm exactly: weird bearded dude in a cream alpaca cardigan standing in the middle of Pets Pets Pets! talking about how all his domesticated buddies needed freeing from their chains of torment.

May had no problem with that; upbeat _Weekly World Planet_ Lifestyle section stories to the contrary, she was sure the owner of Pets Pets Pets! knew exactly where his sad-eyed dogs and rabbits came from and just didn’t give a damn.

But then the dispatcher mentioned the giant strange-smelling cigar the bearded dude was using to put everyone to sleep and all at once the pieces clicked into place: The Big LeBow-Wowski, noted animal rights activist and grower of a nearly paralytically powerful strain of the illicit herbal drug known as “dak”.

May had logged off The City’s mainframe and slipped her tiara out of her purse. Leaving a terse but familiar note for her supervisor about taking personal time, she made it across town, rooftop to rooftop in record time, shinning down a drainpipe to alight, breathless and cold in her American Maid outfit in front of the pet store. Not one innocent bystander clapped.

Squaring her shoulders, May headed for the door, but it opened in front of her and a wheezing, coughing Die Fledermaus staggered out and fell into May’s arms and shook his masked head, stabbing her repeatedly in the tits with the molded plastic ears.

“Air so...thin... Can’t...breathe...”

May lowered Die Fledermaus to a reclining position, leaning his head back to maximize flow of air into his airways. “What happened in there? Are you all right?”

“Can’t...feel...my hair...”

May narrowed her eyes.

“Can’t...escape...craving...for fried, salted snacks...large amounts...”

Becoming suddenly much less concerned, May rose, just as a clutch of mini-skirted secretaries detached from the crowd of onlookers and surged to his rescue.

_Typical,_ May thought. _Even injured he has them eating out of his gloved palm._ And in this particular instance, “injured” was subject to debate. May was afraid she’d already gotten a contact high just from escorting Die Fledermaus to the pavement.

One of the women who’d elbowed May aside in the rush to aid a fallen superhero had opened her purse, and was busily digging through it for something -- Cheetos, presumably -- while Die Fledermaus continued to moan and ask for phone numbers in equal breaths. Glancing down, May spied the solution.

“Excuse me.” She tapped the nearest woman on the shoulder.

“What?” she snarled.

“Wow, okay. Look, sister, I’ve got bigger fish to fry than one half-st-- um, half-squashed mouse. Could you spare a little of your perfume? And that Bendy’s napkin?”

A minute later, prepped and armed, May headed inside.

A chorus of yaps, barks, tweets and thumps greeted her arrival, along with a thick, sweet-smelling haze.

May focused on breathing through her mouth, taking in air only through the acrid, chemical tang of something called _Red Flag_. May was sure whatever color it was, it retailed for more than she made in a month.

“Evildoer!” she called. “Cease and desist your evil activities and come quietly!” The edges of the napkin puffed away from her lips with every syllable.

After a few moments, The Big LeBow-Wowski strolled out from behind an aquarium teeming with brightly colored fish. “See, now there’s just no call for that kind of thing. The only evil being done here is by that guy.” He gestured with a lit joint.

May spared a glance at the pet store’s owner, bound, gagged and giggling on the floor in front of the register.

“You have to leave,” she tried again. “You’re breaking the law.”

“But that’s the worst part, okay? I mean, that guy over there, right, he gets all these innocent puppies and cats and rabbits and whatever that thing over there is with the ears and teeth and shit is--”

“Chinchilla.”

“Okay, that may be, but this guy, man, he’s the evildoer, not me! I know where all my stuff comes from, and it’s not some fundamental religious outpost in Pennsylvania where they electrocute dogs in batches just for not having the right-shaped ears!”

“Your stuff is illegal too, and-- wait. They what?”

“I know, right? Those farmers, they breed a whole bunch of dogs at one time and if they don’t think they can get full-price for ‘em right away then: fzzzt!”

May fought the urge to jump.

“And that guy knows about it! He’s the one keeping those assholes in business!”

“I realize that, but how is this going to solve that problem?”

“Well, you’re here!” The Big LeBow-Wowski spread his arms wide. “You’re a superhero-like… girl-person! You can tell other people! Together we can put those dudes out of business!”

“Sir, you’ve assaulted a City business-owner. You’ve endangered the welfare of countless citizens.” May ticked off the offenses on her fingers as the perfume stung her eyes and laid a film over her tongue. “You’ve required the evacuation of a full City block, and the re-routing of traffic and other commerce.” _You’ve gotten a superhero epically stoned and quite probably laid for the next three weeks running._

The Big LeBow-Wowski took a long drag from his joint, face contorting with the effort of holding in the sweet-smelling smoke.

May held her breath. Even in so short a time, she could almost believe she was starting to feel the drug’s effects.

Finally he exhaled in a rush. “I’m not the villain here, superhero-girl-person.”

May swallowed hard. “The City says otherwise.”

“Okay. So do we have to like, do this, then?”

“Looks like.”

“‘Kay.” The Big LeBow-Wowski stuck the joint back in his mouth and put his fists up in a sad parody of the classic boxing stance.

May rolled her eyes and took the throwing-tiara from her hair, hefting it in one hand.

“Let’s do this,” he said. Smoke leaked out the sides of his mouth.

They did, and it was over quickly.

The throwing-tiara, while a pointy and deadly weapon in its own right, was also sparkly, and as The Big LeBow-Wowski’s pupils widened at the sight of it, they completely failed to register May’s strategically upthrust knee.

The Big LeBow-Wowski crumpled forward, hands clutching beneath the open vee of his cardigan. “No fair,” he managed, then fell to the floor, the joint dropping from between his lips.

Tongue numb and sinuses stinging from the acrid perfume, May stepped forward and stubbed out the lit cigarette under one pointed-toe.

Sirens wailed outside, joined by Die Fledermaus’ raised voice, reassuring The City’s citizens that he had everything under control. And as May looked around at all the hopeful animals staring at her from their cages, The Big LeBow-Wowski repeated his protest. “It’s not fair, man. This is so not fair!”

She was hard-pressed to disagree.

\---

The subway train emerged from the tunnel and slowed for the Night Street station and May relaxed a little in her seat, flexing her feet in the hated stilettos.

After the interlude at Pets Pets Pets! she hadn’t felt like returning to the office, ditto her lonely apartment. So after grabbing a quick burger at Ben’s Diner, May had hunched her shoulders against The City’s evening and jumped on the subway, headed directly for Sewer Urchin’s subterranean abode like a friendship-seeking missile.

At the Night Street station, May blended with the evening commuters spilling from the stopped cars but, instead of climbing the long cement staircase back up to street level, she hung a hard right and slipped through an unobtrusive door hidden a little ways back from the platform.

It was at times like these she could definitely understand the appeal of the sewer to her friend.

The dark and the damp cold, while uncomfortable, were also somehow soothing in their lonely quiet. So different from the pell-mell demands of The City aboveground. Even the disconsolate slow drip of water, somewhere close, echoed the lonely chasm of May’s heart.

She stopped at a raised and rocky callus set at chest height in the far wall, carefully ignoring the knife-edged fin that cut through the muddy canal at her back before disappearing again below the surface. _Echoing the lonely chasm of my heart?_ She flicked aside the fake vent-cover, revealing a keypad. _Urch is so right,_ May thought, _I really need to get out more._

She punched in 1-1-3-8 and waited. _Maybe that new bar over on Chestnut. “Catnapped”, I think is the name. Dear goddess, if I can’t get laid there, maybe I don’t deserve to get pussy ever again._ _Just, for the love of all things holy, no more blind dates._

A section of wall slid back, revealing an ornately carved door.

May reached for the handle. It turned smoothly and she pushed her way inside.

“--I can’t believe you didn’t see me on the news, Stinky! I was magnificent! I was everything any sane man -- and The City -- could ask for!”

Die Fledermaus stood shirtless and masked, leaning over the back of Sewer Urchin’s caramel leather couch, wearing a green bath-towel, drops of water gleaming on his muscles.

May’s hand froze on the doorknob. 

Die Fledermaus caught sight of May and let out a high-pitched scream. Clutching the towel to his waist, he turned and fled down the hallway, his exit punctuated a couple seconds later by the slamming of a door.

For his part, Sewer Urchin remained seated on the couch. He too, wore a bath-towel round his waist, along with his familiar white spiked mask. His bare chest was flushed pink up to his shoulders and neck, and his grin could’ve powered the tri-State area.

“Uh,” May said helpfully.

Sewer Urchin’s smile didn’t dim in the slightest, but he made no move to rise from the sofa.

“I know your code,” she tried. “The door...”

There was a heavy-footed stomping from the depths of Sewer Urchin’s inner sanctum. May recognized that stomping. That was the sound of a giant boy-mouse not getting his way.

“I’m gonna,” she said, gesturing behind her at the door.

“Yeah.” Sewer Urchin’s smile widened. “Definitely.”

\---

Back out in the cold, damp corridor, May’s brain helpfully offered to erase the last four minutes of her life, for sanity’s sake. May, who had faced down Britney Beers, Jason Fryers, and the Lo Fidelity Mutual Funds -- not to mention surviving a two-week relationship with Mighty Caffrodite, the one-girl jet-pack-powered do-gooder machine, gratefully acquiesced. No more thinking, May promised herself, trudging back along the damp corridor. No more thinking until at least Tuesday.

But back at her apartment, the thinking thing reared its ugly head: May’s samsa -- a present from Myrna -- was tilted discernibly to the left. And tired as she was, May couldn’t let an obvious sign like that slip under the radar.

Bending, May put her ear to the door. She listened, hard.

Nothing.

She straightened up and slipped out of her high-heeled throwing shoes, opting for them over the tiara in her apartment’s close quarters. Standing tall, May took a deep breath, centering.

Maybe her mother was right, maybe she should get a dog. After all, life in The City really was dangerous once you got down to it.

May shook her head, clearing it, grateful for the molded plastic heels in each hand _My God, I’m starting to take my mother’s advice seriously: how tired am I? Also, I’m so much more a cat person._

Barefooted and with a high-pitched _hyee!_ May kicked in her own front door.

\---

At first glance, everything looked exactly as she’d left it that morning.

And yet, it was different somehow. As if it had been sleeping all the time May had been living there and now, it was awake. The couch was at a different angle than when she’d left. Possibly because the Ottoman Empress was lounging on it, wearing a soft-looking celery-colored evening gown. Her brown cape lay folded neatly over the back of the couch, and for some reason May got the distinct impression that the couch was nearly giggly with delight.

Now, before May had met Emma, she hadn’t given much thought to furniture. It was...something you chose and had delivered, and it matched the walls and needed vacuuming from time to time with that stubby hose attachment thing. 

But right now all of her furniture appeared to be purring, quietly vibrating in place around the lush, buxom redhead staring at May with an expression of amusement, like seeing a woman wielding killer footwear was the high point of her day.

_Do not look at her tits,_ May told herself sternly.

Emma’s lips parted and she blew a stray red curl off her forehead with strong, vibrant lips. She raised an eyebrow.

May looked at her tits. There was a good reason the furniture was purring. May was tempted to join in. Instead, she gritted her teeth and, while letting her hands falls to her sides, didn’t drop the throwing shoes. “You.”

“Me,” the Ottoman Empress replied calmly. “And you.”

“You didn’t return my calls.”

“Eh. I got your messages. But this is better than a phone call, yes?”

“How’d you get in?”

“I talked to your end table under the door and he came over and, with the help of the planter, worked the deadbolt. You look terrible, my love.”

“You can’t just-- wait, what?”

“Whose jacket is that?”

All of a sudden May became conscious of wearing a complete stranger’s high-end fleece. Her skin crawled. “It was a long day,” she said. “There was this supervillain, at the pet store.”

“Ah. I see. And was he attractive?”

May thought about it. The Big LeBow-Wowski had been...

He’d been sincere, she decided, remembering his eyes, and heartsick and maybe a little care-worn around the edges. For all he’d held up a pet store in the downtown City area, May was convinced that he at least, believed he’d done it for the right reasons. No matter what the outcome. May flashed on Die Fledermaus, pontificating to a circle of lip-glossed admirers, and squadrons of City police in riot gear, just waiting for the word, just waiting to descend on one lone, stoned, middle-aged animal-rights activist. “It’s been a long day,” she said again.

Emma rose and May’s traitorous furniture sighed in unison as she and her celery-colored gown crossed the room.

She stood in front of May, close enough that her perfume was driving May crazy. White chocolate, and a hint of anise; combined with the sight of Emma’s cleavage displayed like a box of truffles--

_Damn it! Stop looking at her tits!_

Maybe there were medals for not passing out. If nothing else, she’d earned one of those today.

“Your voicemail on my phone,” Emma said softly, “You called me, so I came.”

“You broke in.”

“So give me a key.”

May’s mind reeled. _The sheer chutzpah--_

Emma stepped closer and grasped May’s borrowed fleece in both hands, then kissed her.

It was so much better than May had imagined. The warmth of Emma, the intensity with which her mouth demanded May’s...

May dropped her shoes. She pulled Emma into her arms, crushing the other woman against her. They kissed with a feral intensity, dueling until Emma finally pulled back, coming up for air with a gasp. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and looked at May, half- satisfied, half-curious. If May could’ve, she’d’ve leapt out of her costume without the use of hands. This woman, so gorgeous. So...

“Come,” Emma commanded. “You smell like public seating. Plastic maybe, with a metal frame. Definitely fixed in place.” She took May’s hand and tugged her toward the bathroom. “Subway, I’m guessing. But you’ll have plenty of time to tell me all about it.” She thrusts the shower curtain roughly aside, setting the curtain rings singing. “After.”

“After?” May asked stupidly.

Emma turned, still wearing that same intoxicating smirk. She arched her arms behind her, and it was the work of moments before her gown slipped down over a well-proportioned body, ripe with a soft, rounded stomach and a riot of fire-colored hair at the cusp of strong, welcoming hips. May did stare then, but she was fairly sure she was meant to.

“After.” Emma reached out a hand and unzipped the fleece, and pushed it back off May’s shoulders. She leaned in for another kiss and May took the opportunity to tangle a hand in those too-tempting auburn curls piled on Emma’s head.

With a soft coo of surprise, Emma reared back, and with a pale, deft hand unpinned her hair. It fell as one piece to her hips , thick and lush and smelling of black tea, much longer than in May’s imagination.

May took the opportunity to reach back and start unhooking her bustier. After a few moments, Emma helped, then tsked as the whalebone-molded costume fell away. She ran light fingers over the grooves running up and down May’s ribs. She said nothing.

Steam billowed over the shower rail, filling the small room, and May was only too happy to step out of her sequined briefs. They fell to the floor with a thud, then she followed Emma behind the veil, under the blissfully hot water. They embraced, skin on skin, mouths eager and wanting. May gave in, letting the day go, letting American Maid go, letting everything wash away until it was just her and the woman in her arms, sealed together by the heat and the water and the steam.

\---

May’s brain returned sometime around two a.m.

She was lying in bed, Emma sprawled across her, snoring loudly. Annoyingly, the bedroom furniture seemed to be hanging on every drawn-out, wheezing honk and startled snort.

May breathed quiet and easy, staring up at the ceiling.

She was conscious of a strange and unexpected peace, and habitually wakeful in the dark hours of the night, felt compelled to examine the feeling from every angle. She wasn’t sure she liked it, for a start.

Part of the reason May had become a superhero in the first place was this constant, nagging awareness of the inherent unfairness of the world, and her own seemingly unquenchable anger at how it proceeded unchecked and often encouraged. May loved her anger. It got her out of bed in the morning, it got her to work and made her stay late, and when the call came from the mayor’s office, it propelled her up out of her seat and across town, onto a rooftop, into the sewers, up onto a flying carpet; wherever evil went, May went after it, mad as hell that anyone thought they should be able to take over anything that wasn’t theirs. Every time she donned the stars and stripes, she felt the anger focus into a tiny, furious knot in her chest, burning like an ember, powering her forward, fueling every punch, every kick, every throw. And she’d long accepted that even when the anger ebbed away, even when it hid itself, recharging and refueling on the niggling, every-day annoyances, she wasn’t someone who could take things easy. She’d been born to fight, and that generally didn’t bode well for a relationship.

Beside her in the bed, Emma snorted, then with a soft murmur stole the rest of the eiderdown quilt off May. She rolled up into a down-wrapped ball, facing the far wall. Goosepimples formed on May’s exposed flesh, but Emma stirred no further, and after a few more seconds, the snoring resumed.

May stared at Emma’s sleeping form a little while longer, then quietly and under the disapproving stare of her own nightstand, rose and dressed.

\---

This time she crossed The City on foot.

The City’s subways ran all night, albeit after midnight only on the hour. But May didn’t feel like taking her chances. Besides, the jail was only seven blocks from her apartment.

It took some convincing for the young guy at the front desk to agree to her request. Apparently in jeans, sneakers and a lumpy old sweater, May looked nothing like her star-spangled alter-ego. Thankfully, she’d brought both her tiara and her official City’s Official Defenders (C.O.D.) ID card. But not even those and a steely glare could get May through to the cells. She bargained, instead, spelling out her concerns.

The patrolman listened with the full force of his academy training and as May watched, she could see his defenses weakening. Finally he nodded, and called up The Big LeBowWowski’s intake form onscreen. He kept the monitor from facing her directly, still a little unsure of the whole situation, but something in him understanding that law sometimes had to bend.

He navigated to the relevant information and copied it, painstaking and left-handed onto a post-it, which he handed over the desk to this strange woman with the jeans and the sweater and the hair like an angry badger. Then he hit a single key on the terminal and the screen went blank.

May turned and headed back out the doors, back out into The City.

Dawn was still struggling with the skyline, and May hunched her shoulders against the wind, head down and refusing to wonder what Emma would think when she woke up in May’s apartment, alone. After all, she’d let herself in, so hopefully she’d feel at home enough to wait til May returned from her errand. Because some things were more important than phenomenal sex. Few things, true, but they did exist.

With one last glimpse at the address written on he illicit post-it note, May wedged the tiara atop her unruly curls, shoved her hands in the pockets of her jeans and headed for the subway.

Because when everything was said and done, no matter who was saved and who got away, with The Big LeBowWowski in jail, someone still had to go feed his dogs.


End file.
